1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to an antitheft method and system, and more particularly to an antitheft method and system employing a magnetic tag on an item and a smart card for disabling a theft detector.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventional systems are known which include a mechanism (and technique) for disabling an object (e.g., computer). For example, in a retail establishment, typically a system incorporating a security gate as an interrogation device is used. Typically, retail objects are affixed with a tag (e.g., magnetic tag or the like). If the object has been purchased legitimately, then the magnetic field/radio frequency field in the tag is nullified at the point of purchase. As the customer traverses through the gate, the object incorporating such a tag is interrogated, but since the tag's field has been nullified, there is no alarm.
By the same token, if a shoplifter attempts to traverse through the gate with the tag intact and operable (e.g., not nullified by the clerk or the like), then the gate will interrogate the tag affixed to the object. Since the tag has not been rendered inoperable by a tag reader held by the clerk or the like, the gate will notify an alarm (e.g., audio and/or visual). Typically, the alarm can be turned off only by the store personnel, not by the consumer, even if the consumer legitimately purchased the item.
Thus, this method is extremely inconvenient, especially in the case of a computer in a retail or office environment because the computer may become disabled and, if recovered, must be reenabled. Further, such a method would be very disruptive in an office environment where an alarm would be activated and not be able to be deactivated by a legitimate user/owner of the computer. Additionally, in such a conventional system and method, as described in, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,874,902, disabling and reenabling of the computer is performed, but is a very cumbersome and time-consuming process.